To address the issues, the TDP government held Revenue Sadassus twice, aiming to resolve even just five percent of the cases.
Published Jan 05, 2025 | 9:00 AM ⚊ Updated Jan 05, 2025 | 9:00 AM
Andhra Pradesh land disputes. (Representative/ Wikimedia)
There has been an inordinate delay in the resolution of land disputes in Andhra Pradesh which had piled up during the reign of the previous YSRCP government.
After the TDP-led NDA took over in the state in June 2024, the hopes of people soared that they may after all find a solution to the land issues which had been hanging fire for quite a long time.
The sudden explosion of land disputes has been attributed to the Jagananna Bhu Survey. As the survey was fraught with too many loopholes, it gave rise to a huge number of disputes over the ownership of land holdings.
To address the issues, the TDP government held Revenue Sadassus twice, aiming to resolve even just five percent of the cases.
The state government received 53,342 complaints in gram sabhas held in 13,325 panchayats in October 2024. In December, another deluge of 62,732 complaints rocked the state. The state government is now saddled with as many as 1,26,074 complaints in the two months.
Most of the complaints were related to the problems arising out of land surveys, disputes over the borders between land holdings and the lands that had been moved to the prohibited list.
In some cases, the officials in the previous YSRCP dispensation, allegedly changed records for the government lands, helping those wielding political influence to appropriate them. There were also instances of doctoring of records of lands in villages whose owners lived in towns and cities. These land holdings were later on sold away by the “new owners.”
Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu, who is growing restive over the slow pace of resolution of the land disputes, wanted the officials to speed up the process. He reportedly pulled up officials asking how much more time would they take: “We can afford to take our own time to resolve the issues. But the people cannot. They are getting impatient.”
The chief minister flew into a rage at the revenue officials not once but several times during the last six months after the NDA came to power in the state. Even then there is no progress in the resolution of the land issues.
“The officials seem to be at a loss as to how to address the problems,” one senior official said on condition of anonymity.
The officials in the previous government had done the “Jagananna Bhu Survey” in about 45 to 50 percent of the lands. There was an avalanche of complaints then that all rules were flouted in doing the survey. Even then no corrective action was taken.
There were allegations that some surveyors, who did not have a proper understanding of how to do their job, and others who were used to illegal gratifications, had recorded one’s land holding on another’s name.
There were also instances of even jeerayath (rain-fed) lands being shifted to the prohibited list (22-A) category. This way the surveyors had a vice-like grip on the owners of the lands. They used to restore their lands after allegedly receiving huge amounts of money in bribes.
Interestingly, those who were entrusted with the resolution of land disputes under the NDA dispensation were those who resorted to these irregularities when YSRCP was in power.
The staff who deliberately resorted to irregularities now have to undo their actions. They are not doing it, afraid that action might be taken against them for what they had done under the YSRCP regime.
For instance, take the case of one Adarsha Rythu (model farmer) B Sivarama Krisha who has two acres of land in Srungavruksham in Thondangi mandal in Kakinada district. Under Jagananna Samagra Bhu Survey, the land records showed his land as being 20 cents less (100 cents is one acre).
The land surveyors like the one who showed Sivarama Krishna having 20 cents less are not ready to rectify their actions as they do not want skeletons to tumble out of their closets. They have adopted stoic silence despite repeated pleas by the affected farmers.”If the government does not address problems like mine, why should it be there in the first place?” Sivarama Krishna asked.
Another farmer Sivaram felt that it was time the state government made full use of technology. He added, “Chandrababu Naidu who is a tech-savvy chief minister should take a personal interest in addressing these problems. There should be a facility to accept complaints on WhatsApp. There should also be an app for the farmers to lodge their complaints succinctly in about 100 words.”
Undavalli Nagendra, a farmer from Thallur in Gandepalli Mandal in Kakinada district said: “The surveyor who recorded my land details under Jagananna Bhu Survey, showed 20 cents less of the total 1.8 acres land I possess. Though I had furnished evidence that the extent of land that I owned was 1.8 acres, no action followed. I had to move heaven and earth. I met senior officials and raised queries under the RTI. After three to four months of struggle, the officials had rectified the records.”
Another farmer PSK Kanna Rao, a farmers’ leader in Kavali in Nellore district said:” Though it is nearly six months, the TDP government is whiling away time, blaming the previous government for all the ills that are afflicting the state. They admit that there are quite a number of problems but are reluctant to address them. The people have elected the TDP to power because the previous government had committed several mistakes. If they do the same, they would also meet with the same fate that the YSRCP did.”
Though the TDP-led NDA had proposed to stall completely the land survey work initially, it had decided to continue since it was part of the Digital India Land Records Modernisation programme.
As it cannot suspend the programme, the present government has decided to build additional safeguards while recording land details.
Said a senior revenue officer who chose to remain anonymous: “As many as 21 lakh land records were distributed without taking enough care to the need to adhere to rules under the previous YSRCP rule. Of them, we suspect about 25 to 30 percent of land records had been doctored.”
(Edited by Sumavarsha)
